The Fantasy Sports Trade Association estimates that 29.9 million people in the U.S. and Canada played fantasy sports in 2007. Fantasy sports is estimated to have a $3-$4 Billion annual economic impact across the sports industry. An estimated 13 million Americans play fantasy football across major online fantasy sports sites.
Fantasy sports games include contests that allow fantasy sports participants to act as the owner/manager of a fantasy sports team and to select one or more real-life players whose success or lack thereof in real sporting events determines the success of the fantasy sports participants. Several variations applicable to team sports involve a fantasy sports participant building a fantasy team that includes one or more real life players. The fantasy team competes against other fantasy teams based on statistics generated by the real individual players or teams of a professional, or in some case a collegiate or other amateur, sport. Currently available variants of fantasy leagues based on team sports are Rotisserie-style leagues, fantasy points leagues, and salary cap leagues.
Rotisserie-style leagues originated with Rotisserie league baseball in 1980, but have since been applied to other sports with minor variations. In a Rotisserie-style league, fantasy sports participants in the league compete to have an active roster that achieves the largest number of points based on rankings vs. other fantasy teams in the league in each of several statistical categories. For example, in a baseball fantasy league, statistics accumulated by each fantasy sports participant's active roster in statistical categories such as strikeouts; earned run average (ERA); pitcher wins; the ratio of walks and hits allowed per inning pitched (WHIP); saved games; batter hits, runs scored, runs batted in (RBI), and homeruns; and stolen bases are tabulated. The highest ranking fantasy team in each category receives a number of points for that category equal to the number of fantasy teams in the fantasy sports league, the next highest ranking fantasy team in each category receives one point less than the highest scoring team, and so on down to the lowest ranking fantasy team in each category which receives one point. The points received by each fantasy team are totaled across all of the categories and fantasy league standing are determined based on total points per fantasy league team. Similar systems can be used for other sports as well. In a variation of Rotisserie style games, fantasy teams can face off in head-to-head match-ups during scoring periods that are shorter than the full season. The team in each head-to-head match-up with the best performance in each category wins that category. Those points can be totaled either to determine a winner of the head-to-head match-up or for tabulation in season-long standings.
In a fantasy points league, the statistical performances of real players are used to generate a fantasy point score for each scoring period. For example, in football, a touchdown can be worth 6 points, a field goal 3 points, a safety or two point conversion 2 points, and an extra point 1 point. Yardage gained through rushing, receiving, and passing can be converted to fantasy points based on a ratio of yardage to points (for example, 10 rushing yards=1 fantasy point). Optionally, one or more negative outcomes, for example fumbles, interceptions, and lost yardage, can be worth negative points. Defensive players can also be included with points accumulated for defensive touchdowns, sacks, interceptions, fumbles recovered, etc. In baseball, hits, runs, RBIs, homeruns, stolen bases, and walks for a batter can each be worth some number of points while strikeouts, double plays, being caught stealing, etc. can lead to negative points. Pitchers can score positive points for each inning completed, winning a game, striking out a batter, etc. and lose points for allowing runs, walks, hits, homeruns, etc. The points accumulated by real players on each fantasy sports participant's active roster can be totaled and compared to the points scored by the other fantasy teams of other fantasy sports participants in the league. Season long points standings can be kept, or alternatively the points can be used to determine the winner of head to head match-ups between teams during each of several scoring periods during the season.
Generally, in fantasy point and Rotisserie-style fantasy leagues, each real sports player can appear on only one fantasy league team roster at a time. Real sports players are allocated to the roster of the fantasy team of each fantasy sports participant through one or more methods such as drafts, auction, or the like. Participants can exchange players from their fantasy league team rosters through trades with other participants or by acquiring “free agent” players from a pool of real players that are not currently on another fantasy league team roster. In general, the league rules specify roster limits to which each fantasy team in the league must adhere. The roster limits can include one or more of a maximum and/or minimum number of real players that can be on a team roster, a maximum and/or minimum number of real players that can be “active” for a fantasy team during a scoring period, and a maximum and/or minimum number of real players at each team sport position that can be active during a scoring period. In some cases, the participant rosters can be sized such that each roster includes more players than are necessary to fill an active roster according to the rules of the fantasy league. In this case, before each scoring period that can include one or more games or matches, a participant must decide which players on his or her roster should be active for that scoring period and which should be inactive or “benched.”
In a salary cap league, fantasy league participants select players for their active roster from all of the real players in the league, conference, etc. upon which the fantasy league is based. Each real player is assigned a salary number based on that real player's part performance Each fantasy sports participant is given a fixed amount that can be spent on the total salary of the real players on the fantasy sports participant. If a real player's performance increases or decreases during the season, the salary number assigned to that player can increase or decrease, respectively. In some variations, the fantasy sports participant can take advantage of an increase in the salary value of a real player by trading one or more real players for one or more other real players with a comparable total salary to the real players that are being traded. A fantasy sports participant can thereby increase the available salary cap number by trading real players that have experienced a recent increase in salary value for other real players who the fantasy sports participant perceives as currently having an reduced salary relative to the real player's value that is likely to increase due to improved real player performance. Any real player in the real sports league, conference, etc. upon which the fantasy league is based can be on any fantasy sports participant's fantasy roster at any time. As such, it is possible in this system for more than one fantasy sports participant to simultaneously have the same real player on his or her fantasy roster. The fantasy sports participants in the fantasy league compete to accumulate the best statistical performance from the real players on their fantasy sports roster throughout the season.